Just Another Bike Ride

Adelaide has a secret. It has 30km of shared path foreshore with beautiful beaches on one side, regular coffee shops on the other, and a train at either end to ensure that you can always ride the foreshore with a tailwind. Tack the Coast to Vines/Shiraz Trail on the southern end and there are 70km of off-road cycling with minimal hills and a comfortable combination of beaches, cafes, and wineries.

Winter in Adelaide was cold and wet: not Queensland torrential rain wet, just Adelaide miserable drizzle wet, the kind of wet that soaks into everything and doesn't offer compensatory lightning/thunder excitement.

When a break in the weather came along I decided, in honour of the start of a new month and my ongoing quest to average at least 200km/month for the entire year, to do something different (ha!) and go for a bike ride. Roger, keen to take his new Cannondale for a spin, wound up his rabbit legs and came too. We caught the train to Seacliff to take advantage of a tailwind as we rode the foreshore from south to north. The train wasn't very full, even though the football was on. The passengers were in two camps: people like us with bikes in tow, and people all dressed up in football colours.

The South end. The weather looks terrible, doesn't it?

Seaweed covered the beaches at Seacliff, driven in by the winter winds and currents. Further out to sea three little sail boats completed complicated choreography around a series of buoys.

At Brighton, sea kayakers set out in brightly coloured craft under a fickle sun. I walked my bike out along the jetty which was crowded with people throwing optimistic crab pots into the sea.

The sea slopped hungrily at the rock walls north of Glenelg, having taken all the sand and moved it north to Port Adelaide. Not that the lack of sand was particularly bothersome to me: I was too busy setting up symmetrical bicycle poses outside the amenities.

While I busily arranged bicycles, hardy little souls zoomed overhead in the Glenelg waterslide, seeking thrills, adventure, and hypothermia in one easy package.

I caught the train home, not quite satisfied by a very nice ride. I'm tired of cycling in the city. I want an open road, gravel crunching under the tyres, a head wind to swear at and a tent to sleep in. I'm tired of waiting, even if nice rides are better than none at all.

By the time the train got to my station I had found my patience and optimism again. I put my bike away and settled in to plot and dream on Ride with GPS.

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